A town with a plan

With nightly images of hurricane victims passing across television screens for weeks, it might be comforting for Paxton residents to know an emergency plan for the town is now in place.

Asnebumskit Road resident Robert Barrett became the town’s emergency management director in May and took over revising the town’s emergency response plan. The plan received state approval this month.

Announcing the plan’s completion to the select board, Barrett lauded the work of many volunteers who helped revise the plan, which was last revised in February 2000.

“I think the various department heads deserve a lot of appreciation,” Barrett said.

In the event of a serious emergency requiring residents to seek shelter outside their homes, Paxton would receive aid from the Red Cross and Anna Maria College. Anna Maria has agreed to partner with the town and the Red Cross to function as an emergency shelter. The facility has the ability to provide hot meals during a power outage, Barrett said. A second facility in town could be needed, Barrett said, so plans are in progress to evaluate Paxton Center School as a shelter.

The shelters would be staffed by Red Cross staff and local volunteers.

Barrett expects to do a “tabletop” drill sometime soon, to be sure that all the plan’s parts are in place before winter hits, when the town has its most common emergencies. An example is the ice storm of November 2002 that left most of Paxton without power, and, in many cases, without heat.

Barrett and other volunteers on the emergency response plan have been disseminating emergency response information to the public, notably through the town’s Senior Connection magazine. But an emergency preparedness plan for seniors and the disabled recently issued by Barrett proved too long for that publication, and is probably something that all residents, not just seniors, need to know.

Some of the information refers to those with special needs, but much of it is applicable to any situation. Barrett hopes to keep the public updated with regular communications about preparations and response specific to certain types of disasters, like the list at right. The list was assembled by a group of older adults who experienced a two-week power outage in the greater Rochester, New York area.